Episode 8 - How to Increase Talent Diversity in Financial Services

In our latest podcast, Jennifer Cahill and Therese Cadell, co-founders of Savvi Recruitment, along with John Ennis, Associate Director and Natasha Welehan, Principal Consultant at Savvi Recruitment discuss how to use the recruitment process to drive gender balance in financial service organisations.

At Savvi Recruitment, we know all too well the gender imbalances that exist in all organisations, but especially in the financial services sector.

In this podcast we share some of our best tips around ways to improve gender balance through recruitment, and some client recruitment strategies that we've seen that work well!

EPISODE 08 | SAVVI RECRUITMENT PODCAST | PODCAST TRANSCRIPT

Jennifer Cahill: 

Hello, and welcome to the next episode of the Savvi Recruitment podcast. On today's episode we're going to talk about gender diversity specifically. Now, we do appreciate obviously diversity is much broader than just gender but we're going to focus in this episode just on gender diversity: some of the things we see in the market obviously it's a huge emphasis for all companies in terms of hiring and we absolutely see that, as many others will, in terms of to produce a diverse short list in terms of candidates that we're representing for any role. It's timely because after probably over two years of a delay now, the Individual Accountability Framework Bill was published at the end of July and so this is the bill and hopefully, well, projecting it will be enacted by the end of the year, hopefully that will bring into force the Central Bank's proposals around a senior executive accountability regime. It also is proposed that they'll be able to strengthen their kind of administration sanctions against individuals who hold, looking like people in PCF-type roles are going to be the ones that fall in under that regime. A little bit more clarity around who's going to fall into the first tranche of this bill or this act when it is enacted so credit institutions, insurers and high-risk investment firms; so they're projecting about 150 firms in the first initial wave will be impacted by this bill. But they do intend to broaden that out over a number of years so if you're listening and you don't fall into that category or your firm doesn't, it's definitely something that's still coming down the line for you if you're a regulated financial institution. And it was the gender diversity angle on that is that really this bill was proposed by the Central Bank of Ireland after they conducted the culture report on the retail banking sector in Ireland in 2018, and again, finding massive failings there in terms of decision making as we'll all be aware. But very much attributing that in a large part to the lack of gender diversity at a senior management and a board level within those institutions. So again, the Central Bank you know, not skirting around it in terms of the importance of diversity, diversity of thought and experience in terms of good decision making, and I think very much risk appetite, and making sure that there's balanced views around the tables that are making decisions, particularly in regulated financial institutions. So again, there's a couple of things that make this just a timely topic for us to visit. So, what we're going to do is, we're just going to look at some practical things around what firms can do to increase gender diversity, and then also look at just what we're seeing in the market in terms of maybe challenges from our perspective. 

So today I'm joined by Therese Cadell, my partner here in Savvi Recruitment. John Ennis who's a director with the business and then Natasha Whelehan will be a new face, she joined us a few months back, so then Natasha's first time. So again, just bringing you through some practical tips in terms of being able to increase gender diversity and also our observations of what we see in the market. So Therese, I might start with you just in terms of practical things that you've either seen or you've seen to work, I suppose, what firms could do as a first step in improving gender diversity. 

Therese Cadell: 

Thanks Jen. Well I think you start at the beginning and you look at your current headcount and I suppose, assess where you are regarding gender at the moment. Having done that type of audit, I think it's those numbers would be fairly transparent, like any process you need to set some goals and targets. And with that you know, bearing in mind the positions you have and the different functions you have you've got to establish realistic yet reachable gender diversity goals for the organisation, right? And once you've established them, then it's ensuring that you have the metrics in place to track your progress and I suppose, quantify the work. So look, I'm going to keep this simple, that's the first point, look at the numbers, look at where you want to get to, and put your process and procedures in place. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

Yeah, it's like any any other target that company has, whether it's financial or otherwise, you've got to start with a target, everybody's got to know where they're driving towards, rather than just kind of aimlessly going 'okay, yes, we want to increase gender diversity, what does that mean, what does that look like?' So that makes a lot of sense. Natasha, from your side of things then what what else would you would you recommend firms do? 

Natasha Welehan: 

Well, I think Therese hit the nail on the head. Start where you are, see what needs to be done, but then you need to start at the beginning of the actual recruitment process which is candidate attraction. So take a look at your job descriptions, take a look at your job ads, review them. And I think there's a lot more awareness out there now around the language that we're using in our job ads and say masculine coded language and feminine coded language, and the impact that can have on the pool of people that you're reaching. So you know, there's some really handy tech tools - I'm not the techiest person in the world - but there's some really handy tools out there. There's an app called Text Analyzer, another one called Textio. Now you can do free trials on those but otherwise they're paid subscriptions. If you just want something quick and easy I would say take a look at Gender Decoder. It's a website you go on and drop your text into it. It flags to you, are there words that are masculine coded, words that are feminine coded? The reason it's important to know this is there is quite a lot of research out there that says if an ad is very masculine focused in terms of the language that's being used - and these can be words you might not have even thought of like, competitive would be a masculine coded word, ninja -

really popular word at the moment, everyone's a ninja especially in the tech industry, that's a masculine coded word - but these words, this language in the job ad can actually put women off applying whereas there is research that says if the ad is feminine coded men just aren't really bothered. 

The other thing is looking at the actual job ad itself, looking at the list of requirements within your job description, and your job ad. You know, don't have a really long wish list, keep it focused. What do we actually need this person to have to be able to perform the duties of the job? Again there's research out there that says that women tend not to apply for jobs unless they feel that they can tick every box on the wish list whereas men will apply if they tick sixty percent so you know, if it's not necessary just don't put it on there. You are impacting who's applying to your job ads. Also AI, you know, everyone's talking about AI these days, and the use of AI within recruitment processes, it can have its place. It's very useful in terms of you know, booking interviews and so on. But AI can be used to try and remove bias in terms of using AI, using algorithms to actually select from the applicants and attempting basically to remove human unconscious bias. So yeah, that's a new one. It seems to be happening in a few businesses. I haven't tried it myself, I'm not too sure what anybody else thinks about the use of AI. 

John Ennis: 

I haven't seen it being used a huge amount - tracking systems and stuff, use those kind of ones - but, you've got to be careful again. From my reading on it is you have to be a little bit careful because the people who are building it may have been building in bias as well, just in the algorithms and that. 

Natasha Welehan: 

I would agree on that. 

John Ennis: 

You know, so it's not a fail-safe method either I guess. 

Natasha Welehan: 

I would agree on that, and the other thing I would say about AI, it's definitely something that's happening, we are seeing it. My other half works in tech. Possibly more in those large tech multinationals. I would say one of the things and the caveats around using AI, as you say, perhaps people are putting in bias when they're building the algorithms. It's also to understand what AI actually is, it's trained, AI looks for patterns so it could actually end up reintroducing bias into yourself, ironically. I'm not convinced about AI myself but I do think the other, that looking at your actual job descriptions, looking at your job ads, looking at the language that you're using. It's a very simple way of trying to appeal to a wider pool of applicants from the outset. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

I think that's the thing, I think sometimes this feels like maybe a mammoth thing that firms have to overcome and bring it in. But as we're kind of talking through here these are relatively simple things that can be done that could potentially have a very dramatic impact in terms of the numbers of men and women that are applying for particular jobs. The other thing that I suppose, theoretically I've read about but I don't see really in practice - but I don't know, maybe firms do it on the inside and we don't see it? - But is to remove clues from a CV that indicates gender or ethnicity or educational background, or whatever it might be. And actually just removing, anonymizing, the CV from that perspective and just letting a first screen - the hiring managers look at a CV for the merit of the experience alone. Because again, what we're talking about here is is creating safeguards around unconscious bias. So I'm sure anybody would say 'Look, no, God that doesn't impact my decision making when I'm looking at a CV'. Whether it's male or female or ethnicity, or education, do they go to the same university. But there's lots of scientific research around things like confirmation bias and everything that feeds into the fact that we do - we're just human I think there's kind of there's no point trying to eradicate all unconscious bias, but, you need to acknowledge there will always be an element of it there regardless. So you need to put the safeguards in place just to make sure. 

And there's a really good popular example of people auditioning for an orchestra in the US. And the questions started to arise on why is there more men the women in the orchestra. The people who selected the orchestra would have absolutely hand on heart said it's completely on the merit of the music and it just so happens that there's better male musicians that we're seeing over female ones. And what they did was they made everybody audition behind a curtain and just to test it. And what do you know? Turns out that the orchestra composition, over time, when they started to audition behind the curtain, turned out to be more 50:50 and more of a reflection of, equal numbers of men and women at that professional level of music. So again it's not that people are going out to do this and it's not trying to point the finger at people. It is unconscious. But again, because it's unconscious, we're not aware of it, we're not seeing it. So it just shows you that very very simple things can help to create a framework and safeguards around the impact of unconscious bias. Because it is there, and it is happening and there's no point saying otherwise. 

Therese Cadell: 

I hope you're not going to introduce that on the interview process, all candidates sit behind a curtain? [Laughter]

Therese Cadell: 

But another point on that is, diversity in in your hiring panels to ensure that that you're diverse, when when the interviews do happen. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

It comes back to what Natasha was saying about language, because even how somebody explains their experience or talks about things, and women, again we're generalising here, but they tend to be more communal they will talk about 'we' more often. Again, we're conditioned that that's what women are meant to be, more collaborative. So again, language, to a male interviewer on the panel, they might perceive that as, 'oh well, I don't know what they did'. I think that's a really good point, if you have a diverse panel then there's a balance of feedback around that. But also the consistency around - I'm talking to a client at the moment on this - around competencies, and having a framework in your interviews for what you are testing for in terms of competencies, so that interviewers are asked to give their feedback within a framework of competencies with real life examples of where that person demonstrated. And again it's just eradicating the potential for 'I just like them', you know what I mean? I mean you do have to get a good vibe, I'm not saying don't, but to get consistency between first and second, maybe four different people meeting the candidates. You need to create a framework where there's transparency, where there's a consistency around what people are being judged on, and it just helps when two people sit down and go, 'But I didn't see that, and I didn't get that example, how can you say they're strong in that competency', just giving it a more concrete foundation for when you're making these hires. And it's again another safeguard. John, you had one more there you wanted to bring in. 

John Ennis: 

Just in terms of, if you look at the market that we're in, not just in Ireland but globally as well, being a very candidate short market. Everybody's complaining that it's very tight. This is like not just a very useful exercise in terms of 'oh we need to do this for diversity and inclusion' perspectives. Because it's been proven that the more diverse a company is the more innovative it is anyway, so it's not just about doing it for regulatory purposes. I know in this case it is - they're forcing it a little bit upon the financial services firms in this case - but it will actually benefit these firms as well to have a diverse leadership group across gender, ethnicity, race and that as well, to put quotas in place. But also just from a practical point of view anything that we can do to widen that talent pool will actually help us as well in terms of broadening that out. And I think there are practical steps that we can take as recruiters, and firms can take in-house as well, just in terms of the channels that they use as well. That they're not just using their traditional channels, they're widening them out to include disability sites or autism sites, you know, different types of women in work sites as well. That they're advertising their positions across a number of channels that might bring a wider pool of candidates into where they usually get them from, and that will probably bring a more diverse network or pool of candidates in as well. And then I think it's going back to training the people who are going to interview them or select them in terms of looking at them and looking at their skills rather than being influenced by where they went to school, you know? What gender they are, what their name is, what is their education, that type of thing. So it is bringing that in, and I think a lot of companies have done well on diversity and inclusion. We see a lot of positions within the HR function especially, you know, people leading that out and providing training on that, so the people I suppose, understand what it's all about and then I think in order to drive it through the organisation, you just really need the support from management in order to do that. Because they're the ones who control that and if they, as you said earlier Therese, if senior management are putting quotas and targets and really looking at and driving it through, then it will filter down and the policy will begin to be shaped by having that in place. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

Yeah, as I said you have to create the awareness, you have to put the targets in. And again, it's like any other target that you've set for people within your business that they take seriously, like a financial target or whatever it might be. But you're right, it comes from the top down in terms of setting that tone. 

John Ennis: 

We are seeing it more and more that we're asked, where's the diversity in our shortlist, you know? And this is a key focus for us. And it is challenging at times so there's no doubt about it, you know, especially within the financial services sector, particularly, I think it's very challenging sometimes especially from a gender perspective. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

Yeah, and we were going to touch on that, because people are probably listening to this more for the practicalities. I think a lot of us will have read and in theory we know, but the practicalities of making these things happen, it takes a bit longer, and it's not necessarily easy. And it's not a quick you know, flick the switch and it happens. Is around what we're seeing you know when we go to market and obviously our mandate is, and inherently we're female owned and run business, predominantly by Therese, obviously John you're here as well. But you know it is important just inherently to us obviously that we would always think of that irrespective, and that we're producing a gender diverse shortlist, but there are challenges around that. And I know John, you wanted to speak just to some of the things - again we're generalising - but, it's a trend, it's kind of what we would predominantly see. 

John Ennis: 

Well, I think from from from a recruitment perspective when you go to market, and you're looking for a 50:50 short list, even something as simple as male and female, you know, it can be, certainly in my experience, more difficult to get the same amount of women for the same amount of roles, simply because I think a lot of times men will be much more open to having a discussion about a role even if they're happy in their role. Whereas when you approach a woman about a role oftentimes, and not every time, but they will shut you down if they're not actively looking for a role, you know. And in the market at the moment a lot of people aren't applying anyway, so a lot of what our work is is proactively approaching people to see if they're open to a new opportunity, and I find men tend to say 'Well no, I'm quite happy where I am, but you know, tell me a little bit about the role, tell me what the salary is, tell me who's hiring, tell me why they're hiring', and they'll have a whole conversation for 20 minutes with you about the role even though they say they're not interested. Whereas women predominantly I find will say, 'No I'm not interested, thanks very much', and they'll put the phone back down again pretty quickly. And that's the difference. So you've got a much better chance as a recruiter getting more men interested, 'Well, we might have a chat you know', and then and then filtering through that as we go along. Whereas the women that you get will actually potentially be the ones who really are actively looking, but there'll be a smaller amount of them. Because at the moment the market is quite buoyant, people are working away quite happily, anyone who really wanted to make a move has had the opportunity over the last couple years to make that move. And so it is difficult to get the 50:50 shortlist from my experience, they just won't jump unless they're actively looking you know. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

Yeah I would see the same, I would totally agree with you as a woman. I don't know, look, people on this screen will know my bugbear when it comes to women. Particularly even when you get them in the process and they call me, maybe they get an offer, there's so much more they bring to the table in terms of guilt, maybe over a manager that they feel they're going to let down by handing in their notice, or not been here a long time and I'm going to leave people high and dry if I leave. And look, it's great, makes you a very nice person and you're very considerate, but is that the best way to decide things from a career perspective? And I would be a very strong advocate of it's a contract of employment, and it's about fair exchange, it's about what are you getting from it as much as what are they getting from you, and there is always always always, it should be a constant reassessment for somebody about that fair exchange and am I still getting out what I wanted to out of this role? Have I stagnated? Have I stalled? Have I plateaued here, is there enough? And what I would say again is, coming back to your point John, is if somebody calls you and goes are you open to an opportunity, you should always be open to an opportunity, always. Always hear somebody out about the opportunity, because how do you know? You could be happy, but how do you know that there isn't something? And again, maybe you enter into the market, something you hadn't even considered that somebody is interested in your background for. I just say look, there's no such thing as a wasted conversation. And again, what I see women kind of going oh I don't want to waste people's time, I don't like, if I go and meet them it's nearly like them saying to us yes please share my CV, is them saying I will accept the role if offered the role. And that's not the obligation, that's not the bar from our point of view, or clients. Because clients are very well aware, as you said John, in this market that there's nobody actively looking you know, particularly within the areas that we would do a lot in like finance and risk and compliance. Nobody's actively out there, they've moved already so they just want to get you to the table and we are telling clients then it's your job, you know, you've got to put your best foot forward in terms of selling your opportunity to this person. So if you're out there and you think, 'God I don't go forward for things because I don't want to waste people's time', please stop thinking like that. And if something even just piques your interest, have the conversation with the recruiter, but definitely go to the table if you're at least interested and find out for yourself a little bit more before you shut the door on it. And because again, as you said, it does impact our ability to kind of put more people. And it's amazing the amount of, and John and everybody else here, the amount of men who will be like, 'actually there's enough, I'll go and have a chat with them anyway', and they come out they're going, 'Do you know what? I really want that!'

Therese Cadell: 

I think the female loyalty thing is huge to the org, to the people within the organisation, and certainly what I see in CVs, if they've stayed in one place for you know, over five years, maybe eight to ten years, and they move, you then will see them moving maybe every two to three years because they realise there is life outside of where they initially started and that it is a corporate entity you're working for. You can always meet your colleagues for lunch and stay in touch with them as you move on so it's just to think you know maybe a little bit selfish and think what's best for yourself rather than what's best for others. 

Natasha Welehan: 

Yeah, 100% agree. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

Yeah, men are a little bit more naysaying, I'm sorry John, you probably agree with me! [Laughter]

John Ennis: 

They do, they probably just value the networking part of their working life a little bit more you know, and they see it, they probably see interviews, a lot of them, and I think they're right, in that even if they're not really that actively looking for a move, they see it as a good chance to meet somebody from a competitor, they see there's a good chance network, they see it's a good chance to find out a bit of information you know, and then it can often turn to actually, I really want it, you know? But it often doesn't start out, and the curiosity will bring them to the table a lot of times, you know? 

Jennifer Cahill: 

Yeah yeah, but also it comes back to look at why there are not more women at senior levels again, coming back to that point of networking because just market intel, like benchmark yourself, you're having a conversation about recruiter who's contacting you because based on their experience they feel you're a suitable profile, so don't knock yourself out of the race because you don't feel it. Take their steer. But also what are they paying, what's the budget for this role, is that consistent with what you're getting paid? You know knowledge is power, you know the next time you're going in for your annual review, you have to be out there, you have to know when you have to go into those conversations in a very very commercial mindset around, this is what I know my skill set is valued at in the market, not 'I feel' or whatever. I've talked to a number of recruiters, I've either been for a couple of interviews, I've had a conversation with a couple of our competitors, I'm happy where I am but I do know the value of what I'm doing and what my skill set is worth in the market. So again, there's a few things there that are very valuable and that again will encourage more women to, in a very commercial way, bat up and make sure that they're talking themselves up internally, where they are. So it's not just about 'Oh I don't want to make a move' but it's like 'This could help me where I am in terms of me going for that next promotion or looking for that next pay rise'. And again, because we see more men than women willing to do that, kind of keeping their head always up and out, I do think it's a big part of why you know - and again we have gender equal pay legislation coming in there for certain big companies, so again, there's a lot I think that women can do in terms of being more proactive about that and certainly the only way you know your value is being in the market, being out in the market. And not always keeping the head down. Yeah and just relying on, 'Oh if I deliver my job that's enough', and it just isn't, you know what I mean. You'd love to say but once you get to manager level and above, it's less about the delivery on the day-to-day basis, it's equally important the network you have, both in your organization and outside your organization, for you to get ahead. 

John Ennis: 

Sure. 

Natasha Welehan: 

Absolutely. 

Jennifer Cahill: 

So I think we're probably, we're kind of nearly coming up on time there, but I think we've covered - what we hoped to do was to come on, I suppose frame it in terms of obviously the individual accountability framework, you know. It's a timely topic, it's always timely and there's lots of things out there and financial services where we predominantly work, unfortunately isn't one of the better industries for the general diversity at a senior level on board, it just isn't. And hence the Central Bank has come out and will have powers when this bill is enacted to make significant changes to it. We have seen them pushing back on fitness and probity and interviews around PCF approvals using the mechanisms they have had to date to do what they can around it, even though that might not have been overtly said, it's certainly what we would have seen, that they have been doing successfully I would have said. And same with the iron circle a lot more women coming onto the eyelid circle and again that would be pushed by the centre back in terms of their preference to see more women. So look, it is great to see we are seeing change, we're definitely seeing the mandate there. But again just to flag some other very practical, straightforward, relatively simple things that firms can do to help increase gender diversity in firms, so thanks very much everybody.

END.